Steem (STEEM)

What is Steem (STEEM)?

Overview and Purpose

The world of blockchain technology went from being primarily centered around finance to something so much more.

Chances are, you’ve already heard quite a number of use cases touted for the technology, and you’ll probably keep hearing them for years to come.

Whether it be for the health sector or the education sector, you can be sure blockchain may be integrated in some way or another.

But one other use case that you don’t often hear about is social media.

Yes, social media.

If you’re tired of the actions of those big corporations and how they constantly suck up as much as they can from content creators, with them really not getting that much in the end, forcing them to look for alternative sources of income, then the promise of decentralized social media may be something you’ll find appealing.

Already, there have been multiple projects centered around that idea, including the likes of Verasity, Binded, Audius, Sapien, and a ton more.

But one platform that we’ll be looking at in this article is Steemit.

Steem, commonly called the “social blockchain,” was specifically made to power blockchain-based social media and blogging platforms.

It serves as the core technology behind well-known applications like Dlive and Steemit.

Overall, there’s a lot that goes into powering this platform, and below we’ll be taking a look at some of them.

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Key Features

At the core of everything, there’s the Steem blockchain, which has a throughput of around 10,000 transactions per second and a block time of three seconds, though those are claimed numbers.

As for the consensus mechanism, Steem uses DPoS, i.e., delegated proof-of-stake, which sees to it that 10% of those block rewards have been dedicated to “witnesses,” and these are basically the validators within the Steem Network.

Unlike other blockchains using DPoS, 75% of staking rewards that are newly generated are distributed to a reward pool, which compensates users who produce and engage with content Steem-based decentralized social media outlets, or dApps, i.e., decentralized applications.

The reward pool is divided evenly between users curating and moderating content and those creating it.

The founding team behind Steem believed the network’s reward pool model to be a nice fit for the decentralized social media space when compared to those tips, paywalls, or micropayments, which can drive users like readers or others to free alternatives.

Furthermore, the Steem model incentivizes its users to vote, produce, and comment on content.

You may also get a few rewards depending on your contributions to moderating content and even when you discover Steem dApps prior to their popularity.

Sometimes confused with the blockchain itself, Steemit was probably the first decentralized application on Steem.

It enables users to get some cryptocurrency for curating and creating content.

It was released all the way back in 2016, probably making it the longest-operating blockchain-based social media outlet.

It’s used throughout the world, and while it’s more well-known among English speakers, it also has content from other languages.

A substantial portion of users on Steemit create Korean content.

But Steem has had its fair share of controversy.

It was in March 2020 that TRON‘s CEO, Justin Sun, carried out what many would call a hostile takeover of Steem’s blockchain following a partnership between Steem and TRON, which eventually resulted in Sun having a majority stake in the network’s tokens.

So much for decentralization.

Sun then blocked the network’s soft fork, which occurred shortly after and was led by the users.

This eventually led to stakeholders and developers just packing up and leaving.

Some of them then went on to make a new Web3 blockchain known as Hive.

How Does Steem (STEEM) Work?

Content Creation and Curation

This is pretty straightforward.

You can either create content, curate it, or do both.

It’s up to you, and you’ll be rewarded for that.

Whatever you post can get upvotes, or it can get downvotes, and your rewards will depend on that.

Again, nothing too complicated, but there’s also a mechanism known as voting power, which is basically there to limit the people from bestowing an endless supply of rewards or downvotes.

So, the more you vote, the more that voting power of yours will deplete.

Reward Distribution

Although you can buy some Steem-related assets on DEXs (Decentralized Exchanges), or earn them by being a DPoS validator, you may also earn some STEEM tokens by putting effort and time into any social media platform powered by the Steem blockchain.

The more upvotes you get, the greater your rewards will be.

Such crowd-sourced curation is regarded as essential for user engagement and network growth.

Your steem power (SP), which is basically another token within the Steem ecosystem, has a vital role.

The more SP you have, basically, the greater your upvote reward payout will be.

SP holders who don’t vote as often tend to have more weight in their votes, whereas those who vote more often have that weight divided proportionally, as we alluded to earlier.

Furthermore, upvote recipients can receive rewards as an equivalent division of SP and SBD (another Steem token that’s a stablecoin).

The structure is made to grant content creators both a stake within the network and immediate monetary rewards.

Creators may even have the option of receiving 100% of what they’ve earned in SP should they select this payout method.

Transaction and Fee Structure

The Steem blockchain employs free transactions to foster network growth.

Steem’s founders are of the belief that there shouldn’t be any barriers to entry that users engaging with or commenting on content should face.

There have been some studies claiming that even something like microfess may induce anxiety in users while deterring potential adopters from interacting with social media platforms on blockchain networks.

In addition, even blockchains containing microfees that allow for micro-tipping usually have fluctuations in transactional fees that might preclude content-tipping should fees increase.

The tokenomics is partly dependent on this understanding that users, when costs are concerned, demand predictability and that several users are usually accustomed to such kinds of services incurring no additional costs or being free.

But due to the fact that there aren’t transactional fees to eliminate spam attacks, Steem uses a bandwidth limiter to address these occurrences.

Users are subject to a certain amount of bandwidth every week to take part in actions like reacting, commenting, or transferring tokens, while viewing content does not consume any of the bandwidth allotted.

Users who have more SP will have more bandwidth.

STEEM Tokenomics

Token Types

As we alluded to earlier, there’s more than one token powering the network.

So, there’s the STEEM token, which is the liquid token that may be traded or utilized in transactions.

Then there’s the Steem Power token.

which represents the voting power and influence on the platform, and this token can be vested as well.

Finally, there’s Steem Blockchain Dollars, i.e., SBD, and that’s a stablecoin that’s pegged to USD.

Like STEEM, it can be used mostly for transactions in the ecosystem.

Supply and Distribution

The STEEM token currently has no maximum supply.

Its total supply and circulating supply are exactly the same, with over 462 million tokens.

As far as distribution goes, 15% of the network’s yearly inflation goes to SP holders.

Inflation and Incentives

The Steem blockchain began in 2016 without a pre-mine and initially began distributing STEEM at an 800 per minute rate, and its starting inflation rate was 9.5%, which will reduce at a rate of about 0.5% every year until the yearly inflation rate reaches 0.95% per annum.

How to Acquire and Store STEEM

Purchasing STEEM

So, you’re looking for STEEM tokens? Well, first things first.

Look for an exchange that supports them like Binance, Gate.io and HTX.

Once you’ve found it, create an account, go through KYC, and connect your wallet.

Once done, if you already have some tokens with you, you can swap them for STEEM.

But if you don’t, you can just use some fiat methods to either directly buy STEEM or acquire USDT to swap it for STEEM later.

Storing STEEM

So, you already have some STEEM tokens with you?

Assuming you already have a wallet, you can probably look for something that’s more secure, like hardware wallets, which store your funds offline.

You’ll need something like that if you want to safeguard your funds within the cryptocurrency landscape.

Conclusion

Future Prospects

Although it was initially made to be a blockchain-based social media platform, Steem’s feeless transactions coupled with higher throughput have garnered the attention of many, leading to numerous developers building all kinds of applications on it, like blockchain-centric games, gambling dApps, and a ton more.

Chances are, that will likely continue in the future.

Challenges and Considerations

Steem isn’t the only blockchain-based platform to have a social media outlet of its own.

You cannot forget Hive, which was a result of that incident we went over earlier, which many disapproved of.

Besides Hive, there are a ton of others too, so the competition it faces is still very real.

Besides that, there’s those regulatory hurdles to consider too, which is always a thing as far as cryptocurrency is concerned.

We Coin-Labs.com provides only objective information about Steem (STEEM).
Therefore, we are not responsible for the investment decision in Steem (STEEM) and the resulting loss.

Steem (STEEM) Basics

Here are some factors that investors should consider before investing in Steem (STEEM).

Cryptocurrency Features	Steem (STEEM) ()
Publisher or Developers
Headquarters (Registration Number)
Symbol
Platform
Published Date (CMC Registration)	2024-10-02
Max Supply	958,691,258,152,859

Reliability Score of Steem (STEEM) in 2024

These are indexes mesuring the investment reliability of Steem (STEEM) conducted by Coin-Labs.com.

Investment Reliability Rating Items	Scores and Current Status
Company Activation Rate	/ 10.0 CAR
Communication Rate	/ 10.0 CR
Technology Transparency Rate	/ 10.0 TTR
Development Participation Rate	/ 10.0 DPR
Listing Status on the World's Top 10 Exchanges	Listed on 0 Exchanges
Number of Available Pairs Worldwide	1 Pairs
Market Cap of the Cryptocurrency	6,683,329 USD (Rank #1295)

The table above shows the result of investment suitability evaluation for Steem (STEEM).
Check out how we evaluate cryptocurrencies on the crypto rating description page.

Steem (STEEM) Price

Here are the price and recent trading volume of Steem (STEEM). (Data of 2024-10-03 00:15:00)

Price Items	Price and Trading Volume of Steem (STEEM)
Steem (STEEM) Price	0.000 USD
Price Change 24h	-5.48%
Price Change 7d	-4.99%
Trading Volume 24h	11 USD
Trading Volume Change 24h	-82.47%

Cryptocurrency Metadata

You can check the development status and social media information of Steem (STEEM) through the links in the table below.

Metadata Source	URL
🌎 Official Website
📖 White Paper
🛰️ Source Code (GitHub)
🐦 Twitter
🤖 Reddit
🎺 Message Board

Where to Buy Steem (STEEM)

Here are the top ten world crypto exchanges where traders can buy Steem (STEEM) in 2024.

Top10 Exchanges	Listed Status	Page URL
Binance	Not listed
Coinbase	Not listed
Kraken	Not listed
KuCoin	Not listed
Bitfinex	Not listed
OKX	Not listed
Huobi	Not listed
Bitstamp	Not listed
Bybit	Not listed
Gate.io	Not listed

Frequently Asked Questions